*****
It's been a hectic week here at the castle. It all started on Monday evening when I received after-hours support calls on my job. There were a lot of sporadic problems on the network and I spent about three hours working on it... or more appropriately... band-aiding it.
By the time I got to work Thursday morning, the sh!+ had hit the fan and the entire network was essentially inoperable. Production was virtually at a standstill. As my cohort and I spent the first two hours trying to wrap our brains around the problems, supervisors were stressing, workers were slacking and managers were nagging us for status reports -- all the while failing to realize that every minute we spent giving status reports was a minute taken away from finding the solution. Then, after the impromptu status report, we lost another five minutes as we got back to concentrating on the task at hand -- fixing the network.
We ended up calling in a consultant, and we were glad that we did. I know that we would have eventually fixed the problem, but I suspect it would have taken us about four to six hours longer than we needed with the consultant's help. The guy knew his shit!
There were three separate, unrelated problems. The first problem is that our core network switch was malfunctioning. The second was that an electrician tried to troubleshoot a computer issue and ended up plugging both ends of the same ethernet cable into the same switch. This caused a network communication loop, which severely degraded network performance. The third problem was another network switch, located in the plant. The uplink port went bad, causing a broadcast storm... slightly similar to the communication loop.
The only human error was on the part of the electrician, but I'm not going to make a big deal out of it. I know the electricians, and they try to do a good job. I don't want to get into a game of finger-pointing and causing bad blood. So I'm going to send out a few under-the-table comments to the electricians, letting them know what happened without making a big issue of it. No supervisor involvement and no blame-storming.
*****
The heater went out in my truck... during the worst cold snap that I can remember. It's roughly zero degree Fahrenheit, and since I had no heater, I had to drive with the windows down in order to prevent the inside of my windows from frosting up due to my breath. That was some cold sh!+. The worst part is that I had to put up with it for a couple of days because I was too busy at work to schedule the repair. The cool part is that it was only $100 to fix it.
**Note to internet researchers***
The heater stopped working on my 2002 Dodge Dakota. I turned the fan switch to all four positions and no air blew from the vents. I originally thought that my blower motor had burned out, but it turned out to be the fan switch. Not the switch on the console, but the actual resistor located next to the blower motor. The quote for the motor was $400+, including labor, but I took the truck to a mechanic that I trust -- my local Dodge dealer. They got me in and out the same day, and promptly and accurately fixed the problem, costing me significantly less than I had feared.**End note to internet researchers**
*****
I already mentioned that my ex got evicted. I'm really not surprised by this. The big downside is that I was the one who handled the fallout with the kids. The ex called and asked me to keep the kids last night (her scheduled evening), but neglected to tell the kids. I got home, and the kids asked if it was time to go their mom's.
"Nope, you're staying here tonight."
"But why." I wasn't prepared for this. I had figured that she'd already told them. I was speechless for a minute.
"Why dad," they continued? I thought about my options. I could tell them everything. I could make them call their mom, who would sugar-coat everything. I remained silent as I continued formulating my answer.
"Dad, if we can't stay with mom, we at least deserve to know why."
"Okay," I finally answered, "your mom got evicted from her apartment."
The were understandably upset. "Where will we live? Why does she keep screwing up?" I really couldn't say anything, because I'm not a non-interested third party. All I could do was offer them some hugs and tell them they would be safe and could stay with me. This, of course, didn't fix things. They were (understandably) focused on how this would impact their life with mom. My wife and I were frustrated. Once again the ex screws up, throwing the kids' lives into chaos, and we were the ones left to handle the fallout. My game is the long-haul. I know that one day the kids will realize that it's really my wife and me who are there for the kids... who sacrifice for them. But in the short term, my game can certainly be frustrating.
*****
The wife's Grandma passed away this weekend. She had Alzheimer's and cancer, so this wasn't unexpected. But it still sucks to lose a loved one. My father in law is an only child and lost his dad about a year ago, so this is pretty rough on him, which impacts her. I feel for them.
*****
Last night, I got my older daughter's midterm grades. She's getting a D in science and phys ed. (How do you get a D in phys ed!?!) She got a D in science last semester and sexy wife and I told her to bring up her grades or start losing privileges. Last night she lost her cell phone.
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